End of the Snake
by NotasuSama
Summary: Naruto and Sakura travel together to attempt to bring back their old team mate one last time.
1. Chapter 1

First fanfic ever. Naruto and Sakura travel together one last time to try to bring their old teammate home.

End of the Snake, Ch. 1

The trees whizzed by at incredible speeds. Not a single leaf twitched as they ran through the fog covering the forest. They didn't stop to think about it when they came upon the small pond, they just jumped onto it and ran across it's surface, barely causing a ripple. They knew they were on the right track because of the information they had beaten out of a small band of enemy nins. "It couldn't happen in the base," they had said. "There's some sort of cave in the woods, at the foot of a mountain. No one but he knows where it is exactly." They had thanked their opponents with another punch in the gut to each of them, knocking them out. They knew what they had to do. While the base and the village were both protected by powerful wards and jutsus they couldn't even begin to guess at how to break, there was really nothing that could be done about the path to this mystery cave. And that was where Pakkun had picked up his scent.

Naruto and Sakura knew they were close.

They were forced to leave Kakashi behind, from a combination of his injured leg and the need to dispose of the rest of the enemy. They weren't worried about him, if worst came to worst, the copy-nin could always summon some of his dogs to help him.

Pakkun stopped on a branch near the tree line. Knowing that this must be it, Naruto and Sakura landed silently next to him.

"The scent disappears here. I'm afraid I can't help you any more from this point out." They nodded, and the ninja dog vanished in a puff of smoke. The two leaf shinobi removed the backpacks they were carrying and did a quick check on their equipment before hiding the bags with a genjutsu. Apart from their regular ninja tools, such as shuriken, kunai, explosive tags, scrolls, etc., they had each gotten a new, more personal weapon from Konoha's finest weapon shop (run by Tenten's family. It's nice to have connections.) Sakura carried the same kind of weapon Sarutobi Azuma uses: a pair of gray metal knuckles, with blades at the ends. She liked them because they worked extremely well with her taijutsu style of 'punching the shit out of things until they break.' Her newfound strength under the tutelage of Tsunade was nothing to laugh at, and her new weapon made it even scarier.

Naruto, on the other hand, carried a kitana in a fire-red sheath. Not the most common ninja weapon, as most use a straight black sword, worn on the back, like many of Konoha's ANBU, but Naruto wasn't a very common guy. The slightly heavier kitana was just easier to wield, in his mind. Plus, as he said when he bought it, it looks 'more kick ass' than a 'plain old stupid black sword.'

Ninja gear aside, they looked the same as ever, except where they both usually had joyful, happy looks on their faces (especially Naruto), they both wore expressions of concentration and total seriousness. It almost made them look out of character. Naruto and Sakura were both lost in thought. Determination, hopefulness, anger, hurt, and fear were only a few of the emotions playing across their faces as they remembered how he fought against the snake sannin in the forest of death, how he was almost always one step ahead in training, how he was the one who almost got the bell.

How he fought on the roof of the hospital, and again at the Valley of the End.

They knew what they were there for. They had come to get back Sasuke, and they weren't going to fail. No matter what.


	2. Chapter 2

End of the Snake, Ch. 2

"Sasuke-kun," the taller of the two Leaf traitors under Orochimaru's command called. "Preparations are complete. Orochimaru-sama is ready to begin the procedure."

Sasuke said nothing. His brow was furrowed with the effort of keeping himself from killing the white haired Sound shinobi standing at the tunnel's entrance. Killing Kabuto now would ruin his plans… but it was so damn tempting…

Not that Sasuke's plan would help him very much anymore, though. He had expected to be in the village when the body-switch jutsu was performed. Everything he had prepared for relied on his knowledge of the village and the layout of all of the dark alleyways, underground tunnels, etc. It was all worthless now. At this point, the only thing he could hope to do was to go with the flow and hope that an opportunity would present itself.

Instead of responding, Sasuke stayed in his seated position on the ground, cross-legged, meditating. His black shirt, complete with Uchiha crest, sat next to him. His bare back revealed Orochimaru's curse seal on his shoulder, with kanji and shinobi seals running from his curse seal down his left arm, all the way down to each finger, and across his shoulders to the other arm and all the way down. They also trailed down his back and his chest. They ended abruptly, instead of trailing out onto the ground, like when Kakashi put the control seal over Orochimaru's mark. The continuation of the seal markings that currently decorated Sasuke's body were painted on the ground in the chamber at the end of the tunnel Kabuto was currently standing in.

"Sasuke-kun," Kabuto said again, with more irritation in his voice. "Orochimaru wishes to begin, _now._"

"Sorry Kabuto. _We're_ going to take him with _us, _and _you_ can go to _HELL!_"

'_The hell…?' _Sasuke thought. He had to force his smirk away when he saw his two ex-teammates standing in the entrance of the cave. The dobe and the fan girl just might prove useful to him once again.

The two Leaf nin entered the cave very calmly, walking side by side. At least, they _looked_ calm, to the untrained eye. Naruto's killing intent would have sent many lesser shinobi running to their mommies, complete with a new weight in the backsides of their underwear. Kabuto was not showing any such fear, but he was certainly being forced to work to keep up his calm façade. Whatever Naruto had been doing these past few years had defiantly changed him into a different person from the kid he nearly killed when he fought against Jiraiya and Tsunade alongside Orochimaru, if his aura was any indication.

Naruto and Sakura had nearly reached Sasuke when he slowly stood, putting his shirt back on and facing the two intruders.

"What are you doing here?" he demanded calmly.

"We're taking you back, once and for all, Sasuke-kun. You're coming home," Sakura answered just as calmly.

The Uchiha boy's stance screamed 'defiance,' but the young Fox and Slug were having difficulty reading his eyes. Sasuke, Naruto and Sakura, considered by many to be the new 'Legendary Three,' didn't move, didn't speak. The tension in the cave had escalated to an unimaginable level as the three ninja's auras clashed.

Kabuto's calm expression quickly became a scowl. He reached for the radio on his hip and put the headpiece on his ear. "We have intruders," he said quietly.

"Roger," was the only answer. Had it been anyone else, even the Konoha Copy-nin, Kabuto would have taken care of them himself, but the man trained by Jiraiya and the woman trained by Tsunade would prove to be much more troublesome. Kabuto's eyes narrowed. These two idiot kids were _not_ going to spoil Orochimaru's plans. Any minute now, the Sound's highest guard would be here, and these damn brats will never interfere again.

"Kabuto-sama," a voice said. Naruto's and Sakura's attention was quickly re-directed from Sasuke to a shadowy figure in the corner of the cavern. His uniform told everything about him. Black sandals, with bandages tied up to his knees. Black, tight fitting shorts under a brown top that came down to his waist on the sides, but down to his knees in the front and back. There was a ying-yang symbol embroidered on the tunic-like garment under the belt, which was a purple rope tied in the back in a large bow.

He was a member of Orochimaru's personal guard: the Sound Five.

"Impossible! We killed all five of you morons!" yelled Naruto.

"Loud and brash, with yellow hair and whisker-like scars on his face… you must be Uzumaki Naruto," said a second voice. From another shadowy section of the cave stepped another of the Five. He was dressed the same way as the first, but while the other elite guard kept his face hidden in the shadows, this man did not. His build was large; his strength as a ninja defiantly came from the strength of his fist, if his bulky muscles were any indication. His face and arms were marred with scars, and his hair was unbound and fell both behind his head and across his face, over his nose in a diagonal path from the upper left to the lower right. It was not a face that Naruto recognized.

"Indeed, you succeeded in destroying the _previous_ Sound Five," said yet a third voice. This one came from another very large man, also in the Sound Five garb, descending from the cave entrance. He looked very much like an ape, with an elongated, square-ish lower jaw and long sideburns that came all the way down to, but not covering, his chin. At the bottom of his face, the hair grew out another few centimeters, and was tied. He wore a fez on his head. His arms and chest were so large and gorilla-like that they were almost out of proportion in comparison with his lower body. This was probably a good thing for him, though, as his primary weapons seemed to be the two extremely heavy looking short-handled hand axes strapped to his back.

"But I think you would have a hard time with _us,_"said a final voice. The occupants of the cavern looked straight up; a woman with four arms sat cross-legged on the ceiling. She descended slowly from a thin white strands of chakra-filled material she released from her hands. When she got close to the floor, she flipped herself upright and dropped to the ground, landing in a crouched position in the center of the cave. Her hair was in a low ponytail, and her bangs stuck out from under her Sound Hitae-ate.

Naruto looked at the group who had done a _very_ nice job of getting into the cavern undetected. His expression was a mix of boredom and questioning. "A new Sound Five, huh? So where's your fifth? He to scared to come out or something?" His voice and attitude told everyone he was unimpressed, but Sakura knew different. She knew that even Naruto couldn't hope to beat four elite Sound nin by himself, _especially _with Sasuke and Kabuto hanging around.

"He is with Orochimaru-sama, of course," said the first nin, still partially hidden in the shadows. He stepped out to finally reveal his face: a bored expression worn on an unblemished and scar-less face under a forehead rapped in bandages, apparently more for the look of it than anything else. His headband was around his head sideways, like the way Zabuza used to wear his. His body was thin and lithe, with a toned build and medium height. He had a pair of Sai on his waist. "Don't worry about our leader, though," he said. "You won't be meeting him anyway, so it doesn't really matter."

"And you are?" Naruto asked.

The nin laughed. "Why do Konoha ninja always wish to know the name of their killer? Ah, it doesn't really matter, I'll tell you anyway." He smirked, as though Naruto and Sakura should have been honored that they were receiving an introduction. "As you have already deduced, we are of the Sound Five. I am Taiki, of the North Gate."

The ape man stepped forward. "Same for me, West Gate's Jidanbou."

The spider-woman pulled her right arms across her body and locked them with her left ones, stretching out her side. "Same for me, East Gate's Kumoru."

The scarred man cracked his knuckles and popped his neck. "Same for me, South Gate's Kuroda."

Sasuke's face betrayed no emotion, but inside, his mind was racing. '_How the hell do I continue from here?_'

Naruto was having similar thoughts. He knew that he and Sakura were of the best Konoha had to offer, but still, two against six was a little much, especially considering the opponents.

'_Well, nothing much to be done about it now,'_ Naruto thought. He raised his hands in front of his chest and lowered into a defensive stance. _'I'm just going to have to tear through them.'_ He could feel the red chakra he had grown so accustomed to using beginning to spin in his chakra circulatory system. Sakura felt the change in him as well, and began to give him some space. The Kyuubi's chakra was extremely frightening, even to friends.

The chakra retreated, however, when he became distracted and lost his concentration as yet _another_ voice filled the cavern. "Figures. The dobe can't even take care of ONE mission without getting into the worst situation imaginable," said a male voice from the entrance, surprising everyone. "Well, we may as well lend a hand."

End Ch. 2

Ok everyone, please, nobody tell me how bad I am at doing detail, because I already know. This chapter has been bothering me recently, so I figured I'd take some time to put it down on paper. I once told some people that this story would only have Naruto, Sasuke, Sakura and Orochimaru in it, but I came up with a better idea. As I sit here watching _The Grinch_ with Jim Carry, I wonder how many people will understand and appreciate and/or hate me for the obvious Bleach reference. As for who 'may as well lend a hand,' well, you'll find out next chapter. See ya next time, minna!

-Notasu-


End file.
